File delivery and naming that saves you an hour a week

This is the least interesting subject in outsourced editing and one of the most valuable to get right. Files that come back needing renaming, resorting or resizing have moved work rather than removed it, and the time cost is invisible because it is spread across every job.

Setting conventions once takes an afternoon and then never needs thinking about again.

Decide the folder structure first

Use a structure that matches how you deliver to clients, so the returned folders can be passed on directly.

A structure that works for most property photographers:

• A top-level folder per job, named with the date and the property address in a consistent order.
• Subfolders by treatment where a job mixes services: interiors, exteriors, twilight, staging.
• The raw captures in their own folder, kept separate from anything already processed.

The date-first convention, written as year then month then day, sorts chronologically by default and avoids the ambiguity between day-first and month-first ordering across different countries. That ambiguity matters when your editor is in another market and reads dates differently from you.

Name files so the order is obvious

Camera file names carry no meaning and reset periodically, which produces collisions. A short convention fixes it:

• A sequence number that reflects intended delivery order, padded so it sorts correctly past nine.
• A short room or subject identifier, such as kitchen, master, exterior-front.
• Nothing that varies between jobs, such as your initials or a client name, since that adds length without information.

The sequence number matters more than people expect, because the order photos appear in a listing affects performance. Deciding the order at upload rather than after delivery means the returned set is already sequenced. Which order works is covered in the order listing photos should appear in.

Keep brackets grouped and unmerged

Send bracketed sets as their individual frames, in their original order, with nothing pre-merged. Studios blend by hand from the separate exposures, and a file already combined by camera or software removes the control that produces good results.

If your camera does not name brackets in an obvious sequence, group them in subfolders per composition. It costs a moment at upload and prevents an editor guessing which three frames belong together, which is the most common cause of a query on a first job.

Say what you want back, once

Write a short delivery specification and give it to your editor at the start. It should cover:

• File format. Almost always JPEG for delivery, with the quality level specified.
• Dimensions. The long edge you need for the portals you use, plus any second size if you deliver both a full-resolution set and a web set.
• Colour space. sRGB for anything going online, which is nearly everything.
• Sharpening. Whether you want output sharpening applied and how strongly.
• Naming. Whether returned files keep your names exactly or take a suffix.
• Folder structure. Mirroring what you sent, which should be the default.

The naming point deserves emphasis. Ask for your original names preserved rather than a studio's internal convention. Anything else means renaming before delivery, every job, forever.

Choose a transfer method and stay with it

Dropbox, Google Drive, WeTransfer and FTP all work. What matters is picking one and using it consistently, because a workflow where every job arrives differently creates friction on both sides.

Practical considerations: shared cloud folders suit ongoing relationships because both sides see the same structure and nothing expires. Transfer services suit occasional work but expire, which becomes a problem when a client asks for a re-delivery weeks later. FTP suits very large volumes and photographers who already run it.

Whichever you use, keep your own copy of originals until the job is fully delivered and accepted. Transfer services are not backups.

Write the note that prevents the query

Include a short text file or message with each upload covering anything not obvious from the files:

• Which images are hero shots.
• Anything to remove, and anything explicitly to leave.
• Rooms where something unusual happened during capture.
• Client-specific requirements, such as an agent who dislikes replaced skies.
• The deadline, if it differs from standard turnaround.

Three sentences here saves a full cycle when your editor is in another timezone, as covered in working with an editor in another timezone.

Handle versions properly

When corrections come back, agree how revised files are named. The two workable options are overwriting the original delivery in place, or a clearly marked revision folder. What does not work is a mix, which produces sets where nobody is certain which file is current.

If you deliver to clients from a cloud folder, overwriting in place is usually cleaner, because the link you already sent stays correct.

Archive with intent

Decide upfront how long you keep originals and delivered sets. Property images are occasionally needed again: a listing that returns to market, an agent who lost their copy, a dispute about what was delivered.

Keep RAW originals for as long as your storage allows, since they are the proof of authorship discussed in who owns edited photos. Keep delivered sets at least until the property has sold. And agree separately with your editing partner when they delete their copies, which should be part of the data conversation in the security questions your editing partner should welcome.

None of this is complicated. It is simply the difference between a workflow that costs you nothing and one that quietly costs an hour a week. If you want to see how we handle delivery specifically, the full cycle is on the how it works page.